


tick, tick...DOOM

by lionessvalenti



Category: Agents of Cracked
Genre: Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-22
Updated: 2014-06-22
Packaged: 2018-02-05 19:09:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1829065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lionessvalenti/pseuds/lionessvalenti
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As time passes, Dan starts to wonder if things aren't the way they seem.</p>
            </blockquote>





	tick, tick...DOOM

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



Dan knew that time moved differently around Michael. Three minutes could feel like three hours or three months. Or any excruciatingly long amount of time, but it still _wasn't over_. But three years could feel like it had gone by in an instant. Time didn't make sense around Michael, and Dan knew that.

But the point was, Dan had stopped noticing.

He didn't know how Michael owned a house in North Carolina. Maybe it was a gift from the Chief, or Sarge. The idea that it came from Sarge made sense (after Michael vehemently denied ever having lived east of Las Vegas before now) when Dan discovered a suspicious amount of blood stained onto the original flooring after pulling up a section of the carpet in the living room.

"More like the met your ultimate demise room, am I right?" Michael had said with a laugh as he pointed at the stained flooring.

Dan considered the stains, the terrible shag carpeting in sea foam green, and the carpet went back down. That was a problem he could deal with later.

Other than the carpet, the house was rather nice. It was near the beach and there was a large yard. It was nice to have a space for Michael to run around. There were several nosy neighbors ("A gay couple moved in at the end of the block"), but that took the pressure off keeping Michael's antics a secret. It wasn't possible, so Dan didn't even bother.

The settled in. They settled into small town life where the neighbors loved Michael and thought Dan was weird. They settled into their little house with the ugly carpet and with the ghosts of the house's former inhabitants, probably. They settled into a pattern where Michael went to work at the courthouse Monday through Friday (or Tuesday through Thursday, because Michael) and Dan wrote novellas that he self published under a pen name, that he would not admit to anyone, even in this work of fiction.

"Remember when we worked here?" Michael asked one night, pointing to his laptop screen.

"We never worked at Google," Dan replied, hardly looking up from the steamy sex scene he was in the middle of writing. It was cheesy, but he had to admit, he was getting a little turned on himself.

"No, the internet!" Michael typed loudly, his fingers flying over the keyboard. "Look!"

This time Dan peeled his eyes away from his own screen and looked at Michael's computer. There it was, Cracked.com. The site looked different than the last time he'd been on it, but the article titles were the same. 5 Secrets Your Doctor Won't Tell You (That Are Actually Common Sense). 4 Real Life Animals with Comic Book Superpowers. 6 Insane Fan Theories about Yoda's Penis. 5 Ways Your Parents Actually Did Ruin Your Life. 4 Mind Blowing Images and 1 That's Just Okay. 7 Butts No One Would Have Sex With.

"I'd have sex with number four," Michael said. "This article is bullshit."

But Dan wasn't looking at the really gross butt pictures. He remembered Cracked, of course. It had only been a few short years ago, but now that he was thinking about it, working there felt like million years away. Sure, he had moved, and he had a boyfriend now, things he definitely hadn't had when he worked there. His life was so vastly different now, of course that felt like so long ago.

"Dan?"

"Yeah?" Dan looked back at Michael. "What?"

"Would you have sex with one of these butts?"

Dan blinked and slid off his chair to join Michael on the floor. "Number two isn't bad."

"Number two? Gross! Even I wouldn't have sex with number two, and you know I'll put my dick in just about anything. For example, I put my dick in you." Michael laughed and Dan smiled. This was okay.

*

Dan began his day with a bowl of Wheaties and the local newspaper's website on his laptop. "Huh. Mrs. Franklin died."

"Who's that?" Michael asked. He was emptying packages of Smarties into a bowl. Dan could only assume that he was going to eat it like cereal. "Are you still reading the obituaries first? Are you still not happy, Dan?" He gazed across the table, concerned.

"I'm happy! It's... habit. Tradition. Mrs. Franklin is - was - our next door neighbor. She's the one who made us that weird penis cake when we moved in. God, how long ago was that? She wasn't that old."

Michael shrugged. He pulled on the ends of the plastic roll and dumped the content into the bowl. He still had a pile of candy next to him at the table. Dan wasn't sure it was all going to fit in one bowl, but if anyone could make it fit, it was Michael.

Dan didn't want to think about the science and magic of Smarties cereal in relation to bowl sizes. While Michael never concerned himself with things like _time_ or _other people_ (who weren't Dan), Dan thought about their neighbors. Sure, he hadn't talked to any of them in months, mostly because they didn't like him as much as they liked Michael, but he knew they were there.

After breakfast, Dan went into the bathroom and looked in the mirror. Same glasses, same short, slightly balding hair. They had been living in North Carolina for _years_ now, but Dan looked like he hadn't aged a day since they left LA in the hot air balloon.

He'd noticed that Michael still looked the same, but that was Michael. He was immortal, or something. It was hard to assume anything else after he'd witnessed Michael surviving multiple head explosions. And Michael was an offspring of gods. Or something.

Dan was a regular person. Less than a regular person. He was crap, except in the eyes of Michael (or occasionally, mostly in the eyes of Michael). If he was certain of anything, it was that he was going to die someday, just like everyone else. There was no reason for this. He couldn't even blame good genes because if he had that, the hair wouldn't be a thing. And certainly, he'd have aged sometime in the last ten years. Or fifteen years. It was hard to remember how long it had been. How long had he been living with the horrible shag carpeting?

"Michael, are you using magic on me?" Dan asked as he burst out of the bathroom.

"All the time," Michael replied. He didn't look up from the loud military game he was playing on the X-Box.

"Are you keeping me from aging?"

Michael paused the game and looked over at Dan. "You look old to me."

Dan's shoulders dropped. "Thanks, Mike. I appreciate that." He plopped down next to Michael and watched him play for a while.

"What about the Chief?" Dan asked. "Remember when he gave that girl two more years on her life? What if he gave me like... a million years?"

"Why would he do that?" Michael asked, not looking away from the TV. "Out of all the people in the world, why you?"

Dan considered the question for a moment. It made sense. He was nobody, but Michael was somebody. Dan was insignificant, but Michael was important. Michael had be protected, to be hidden, and he couldn't do that on his own. He needed Dan, and the Chief knew that. It was the only reason he met Michael, the only way he passed his performance review.

"For you?" Dan suggested quietly.

Michael turned and looked at Dan. This time he didn't pause the game and something exploded in the background as he closed the space between them and kissed Dan hard on the mouth. It was sloppy, wet, and classically Michael.

Dan was breathless as Michael pulled away. One kiss turned him on way more than his own erotica.

"Don't be ridiculous, Daniel," Michael said. He turned back to the video game and began shooting at men on the screen.

"Right, of course not." Dan dropped his head on the back of the sofa. "Should we go to Mrs. Franklin's funeral?"

"Who?"

"Nothing. No one." Dan sighed. Michael could love him and brush him off in the same breath. It wasn't uncommon, but at the same time... Dan thought maybe he was the right one this time. There was no way of knowing, at least not for another thirty years, but until that day, Dan was going to try to enjoy himself.

He was definitely going to Mrs. Franklin's funeral.


End file.
